


There's an Agent in my Soup!

by Heliophile



Category: The Professionals
Genre: For moonlightmead, M/M, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2015-07-05
Packaged: 2018-04-07 19:48:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4275765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heliophile/pseuds/Heliophile
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For moonlightmead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	There's an Agent in my Soup!

**Author's Note:**

  * For [moonlightmead](https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonlightmead/gifts).



> This was originally written well over two years ago, on the occasion of a certain memorable evening in the Scarsdale, when we first heard the news of mm's diagnosis. It was not then intended for publication at all, being purely by way of a virtual hug for its recipient (and hitherto only ever seen by her and by bsl who kindly beta'd it for me), and should not be read as a story so much as a ... well, a card with a photograph tucked inside. 
> 
> I should probably clarify that there really were some strange exchanges going on at the neighbouring table, without which this will be even more confusing than it already is (including the prosaic line "I bet you've slept with my wife"). 
> 
> All comestibles mentioned were actually eaten in the making of this fic.
> 
>  
> 
> In the course of a recent conversation somewhere not far from the sea, mm concluded her verdict with regard to the inclusion on AO3 of the text you see below with the immortal words "Stick it in"

I WOULD JUST LIKE TO SAY THAT NONE OF THE FOLLOWING IS MY FAULT. IT IS ENTIRELY DUE TO PEOPLE AT ONE END OF THE TABLE BEING SILLY ABOUT SOUP AND MINIATURE AGENTS IN FORM-FITTING WETSUITS. SO THERE.

 

 

_There's an Agent in my Soup_

“Can't see a bloody thing out there. Real pea-souper, eh? Pea-souper, get it, Ray, I said it's a real –”

“Tomato. It's flamin' tomato soup and you know it. And we'd better hope the thermal insulation on this diving gear is up to the job, or you an' me are toast, mate.”

Ray grimaced as a shout of laughter came over the ear-piece.

“Toast! Oi, you said toast – thought I saw a couple of croutons up there when we were on our way in!”

Ray gritted his teeth. Typical of Bodie to treat the whole thing like a joke – when they were the equivalent of twelve feet down in a liquid hot enough to scald the flesh off their bones in pretty short order if the high-tech suits failed. What kind of place had their old pub turned into? The whole bowl was still _bubbling_ , for fuck’s sake. And of course visibility was zero out there… they had heads-up holo displays all right, but it wasn't the same as actually being able to _see_ …

Ray shook off his irritation. “Right, come on Bodie. We’ve got to find our way to the spoon before whoever it is up there decides it's cool enough to take a mouthful. Only one person around here gets to take a bite of me, and I'm looking at him – or I would be, if we weren't practically blind down here – dammit, why the hell we had to get landed right in the _soup_? What's wrong with those nacho things, that's what I want to know – or the sandwich, or that veggie tart, plenty of cover there...”

“Fancy being my veggie tart, do you, eh Ray? Just for me? I could just go for a taste of you in nothing but a lettuce leaf ...” Bodie went on exploring their surroundings. “Wouldn't mind a nibble on a nacho meself – ” Bodie paused, still casting around for the spoon but with a little less enthusiasm. “Although seriously, why the soup…”

“Yeah, well, I'll nibble your macho nacho later, all right? We've got work to do. Bloody soup … And you know it’s because when they set up the coordinates to send us in, displacement is less of a problem with liquids!”

“Yeah, something like that. Hey, over here mate – reckon I've found the spoon. Come on, up you go – ”

Bodie linked his fingers, making a stirrup for Ray to get a foothold on his way up the spoon and out to the edge of the bowl. This was the tricky bit – they had to move fast, the stealth tech incorporated into their skin-tight diving suits would make it hard for anyone to catch a glimpse of them – hard, but not impossible.

Fortunately the shadowy giant figures far above them seemed to be totally absorbed in something overheard from the neighbouring table – something about someone sleeping with someone else's wife … good, the B-squad agents' distraction had been perfectly gauged.

Quickly, Ray reached down and helped Bodie up the smooth, slippery shaft of the spoon and both men dropped silently to the table-top in the shadow of the ciabatta. They could raise their visors and draw breath before making the next move. Bodie brushed a finger over Ray's cheek – and tasted the soup approvingly; Ray rolled his eyes, and they grinned at each other a moment before it was time to head out across the vast exposed spaces of the table. Coordinating with a glance and a gesture, they set out for the distant plates, ducking quietly beneath an overhanging nacho and creeping silently past the tall chicken sandwich until they reached the curved pastry wall of the beetroot and onion tart.

“Right, load 'em up. Aim right into the heart of the filling – make sure these nanogene-avatar-whatsits get where they're going...”

Lining up with infinite care, Bodie sighted along the harpoon gun's long barrel and fired deep into the pie.

The two men looked at each other. Bodie nodded once, and Ray activated the homing device. They knew their aim was true.

Back at HQ, Bodie closed his eyes for a moment as the technicians peeled them out of the simulator-remote projection equipment with all its pads and sensors. He sighed, then looked across at his partner of going on thirty-five years and smiled as he caught Ray's eye.

“It was fun, though, wasn't it – being thirty years old again for a bit?”

Ray smiled back, without a word of misgiving for once about their intervention. This was one job he was only too happy to have undertaken in their brave new world. Now as soon as their target ate so much as a bite of that tart there would be an unending supply of microscopic avatars of themselves coursing through her bloodstream, ready to do the job their full-sized counterparts had always done – take down any undesirables, using any means necessary. And they had a _lot_ of firepower behind them.

The two CI5 consultants nodded their farewells to the tech staff and their B-squad support team as they left the building. It was cold, and dark outside – and very, very beautiful in the snow.

Bodie rested a hand on Doyle’s shoulder, his thumb unobtrusively brushing the skin above the other man's coat collar. “Fancy a walk in Holland Park later? I 'aven't snowballed you yet, with all this work going on.”

“All right, you're on. But anything to do with balls, I want no snow involved, all right?”

Bodie laughed. “OK, we can save playing with balls for later. Hot toddy by the fire at home after, though, yeah?”

“I like the way you think, mate. Predictable, mind, but I like it.”

“That's because you've finally worked out when you're lucky, sunshine. It may have taken a while to percolate through that mop, but I reckon I might just keep you now.”

Ray grinned. He knew Bodie had worked out that he was lucky too.

Walking very closely together, the two men strolled out to enjoy the night … while a million million microscopic nanogene avatars, each linked to its partner via the unbreakable B-Dy chemical bond, tirelessly patrolled a certain someone, ready to inhabit the mind's eye and typing fingers, and to deploy a vast arsenal from **R** adar **O** perated **S** elective **E** xcision **S** plines to **L** ow **A** mplitude **V** ector **E** mulating **N** on **D** oppler **E** mission **R** ays.


End file.
